France, birthplace of the impressionist movement, glitters with countless artists´ treasures. Find out more about past and present day artists.

Chez Monet – GivernyClaude Monet spent the last decades of his life in Giverny nurturing a garden from which he painted Impressionist art. Pair a visit to his home and water lily garden with a tour of the American art museum. Afterward, stop in Vernon for a glimpse of half-timbered architecture and a poppy macaron.

Edvard Munch – The Anti-ScreamThe Pinacotheque is currently exhibiting Edward Munch’s oil paintings and wood gravure prints that range from landscapes to macabre depictions of illness and death. To make and afternoon of it, browse the bookshop and order a coffee and dessert next door at Fauchon.

How Antibes Weathered the StormNovember has been an unusual month on the Cote d’Azur, first as the G20 summit temporarily closed Cannes, then as storms ravaged the coast. On a stretch of beach piled so heavily with debris that it resembles a beaver dam, a village of driftwood forts has been erected.

Lucien Freud at the PompidouLucien Frued aimed for rawness rather than painting glossy artistic nudes. In the canvases on exhibit this summer at the Centre Pompidou his subjects resemble marbled meat in tones of grey and cream administered in sweeping brush strokes.

Nouveau RéalismeDecree that an object is art, display it as such, and that is what it becomes. France’s emerging avant-garde artists of 1960 sought to renew art with abstraction and themes of destruction and spontaneity surfaced.

Picasso in ProvenceThe influence that Cezanne's work held over Picasso is the subject of this summer's exhibition at the Musee Granet in Aix en Provence. In collaboration with the museum, Chateau de Vauvenargues, the artist's Provencal residence has been opened to the public for guided visits.

Vincent Van Gough's Last DaysIn 1890 an overworked Vincent Van Gough escaped to Anvers-Sur-Oise. After several months in a rented chamber of the Ravoux Inn he took his own life. He lies beside brother Theo in a graveyard beyond the sprawl of yellow wheat.